


sleeplessly embracing you

by magicsoul (cherishiskisa)



Category: Monsta X (Band), Triple H (Korea Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Everyone Goes To CalArts, E-Boys Vibing But In Like A Sad And Pathetic Way, Explicit Sexual Content, Friends With Benefits, Love By Proxy, M/M, Pining, Recreational Drug Use, Semi-Public Sex, also Moping and Yearning and Simping, commissioned!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-13
Updated: 2020-10-13
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:42:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,249
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26956021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cherishiskisa/pseuds/magicsoul
Summary: Changkyun moves slow. Hyojong moves slower. Sometimes, they’ll spend a whole weekend together without saying a single word to each other out loud, and this weekend is one of those. But for once, they’re actually working on something big.
Relationships: (the triple h and changki are Future Only), Im Changkyun | I.M/Yoo Kihyun, Kim Hyojong | E'Dawn/Im Changkyun | I.M, Kim Hyojong | E'Dawn/Kim Hyuna/Lee Hwitaek | Hui, Kim Hyuna/Lee Hwitaek | Hui
Comments: 12
Kudos: 42





	sleeplessly embracing you

**Author's Note:**

  * For [huilight](https://archiveofourown.org/users/huilight/gifts).



> DAWNKYUN NATION: THIS ONE'S FOR YOU. yuta huilight commissioned me to write this and i stuck so closely to the prompt that i wont bother retyping it mwahaha... but i had SO much fun writing this i've missed dawn pov SO much and i really hope you all enjoy!!!!!!!!!!
> 
> warning: dawnkyun do smoke weed a couple times in this, but it's very brief and not described in graphic detail. also warning for lots of moping and yearning and pining. also warning for calarts. i am now obsessed with au: everyone goes to calarts, so sorry in advance for my brain worms. without further ado, please enjoy working title "can we simp :(((((", actual title from hunger of the pine by alt-j!!!!!

Changkyun is a good friend to go to bed with. He’s a good friend, period. Hyojong isn’t really surprised when he gets back from class and Changkyun is already in his apartment, eating takeout at his table. They share Changkyun’s lo mein, put on Tim Burton’s _Alice in Wonderland_ with the sound muted, and sit on opposite ends of the couch with their headphones on, working individually and occasionally AirDropping each other snippets of their current projects. By the time the sun’s gone fully down, they’re both tired but not sleepy, so they squeeze onto Hyojong’s small balcony, shoulders pressed together, and pass a blunt back and forth until Changkyun burns his fingertips. “Is it cool if I crash here?” Changkyun mumbles around his index finger in his mouth. “Don’t wanna take the bus right now.”

His roommate is also probably back from his week-long vocal performance workshop in Michigan and Changkyun needs to steel himself before he sees him again, after such a comparatively long separation. “Sure,” Hyojong replies, and they go back inside. Yeah, Changkyun is getting out his phone to send a text — Kihyun’s definitely back. Hyojong watches, but doesn’t say anything, and Changkyun sees him looking and makes a face. Sometimes Hyojong wonders whether this is what best friends are supposed to do, how they’re supposed to act, but he doesn’t know if Changkyun reciprocally considers him his best friend, so it’s going to have to remain in the realm of the unknown.

Hyojong’s bed is big enough for three — the only luxury in his fairly small apartment — but there’s only two of them, and they don’t tend to cuddle much. Changkyun is on the left, Hyojong is on the right. “How’d it turn out?” Hyojong asks once they’re settled, in boxers and tees, the blankets pulled up to Changkyun’s chin.

“Here,” Changkyun says, and after a few seconds of tapping his thumb on his phone screen until he finds the file, music fills Hyojong’s room. Just an instrumental for now, but Hyojong can hear where the high vocal line would go. Changkyun left space for it, which Hyojong knows because he always does the exact same thing. It’s good; everything Changkyun produces is good. Changkyun is good.

Hyojong tells him so: “I like it.” He moves a little closer in bed, hesitant and shy. It’s not that the weed makes him horny — it’s just that he always wants to be touched, and there’s someone here who’ll do it. Changkyun’s on the same wavelength, and his phone’s still in his hand as he scoots to meet him, to close any distance between them. Hyojong’s phone is off the bed, but the sound is on, just in case. Changkyun reaches for him and lets his phone fall out of his grip, and Hyojong’s hands slip under the covers, slide under Changkyun’s t-shirt, and they fit together, a little clumsy and uncoordinated but not in a bad way.

Changkyun shivers, twitching away for a second. “Cold,” he explains on a breath.

“Sorry,” Hyojong murmurs and curls his fingers so he can warm his knuckles on Changkyun’s skin, too. Changkyun shivers again but this time he stays still and lets Hyojong’s hands equalize, until Hyojong isn’t sure if his hand is warm or if Changkyun’s stomach has gone cold. Changkyun tucks his face into Hyojong’s neck — he’s normally about half an inch taller, but when they’re in bed it doesn’t matter — and breathes, breathes his pulse point underneath his jaw, and Hyojong closes his eyes and lets his body feel skin on skin on skin, their legs locking together and their hands finding their ways back down between them.

They don’t do much talking, during. It’s almost too embarrassing to acknowledge that they’re both there, doing what they’re doing. If they weren’t too lazy to arrange themselves in bed, they’d sixty-nine all the time, just to have an actual excuse not to talk. But it’s nice like this, Changkyun panting hushed, wet breaths against Hyojong’s jaw and Hyojong curling one hand around the back of Changkyun’s head, the other fitting loosely around his dick. Changkyun is stroking him, too, varying up his speed and tightness, because Hyojong is sensitive, he needs a careful hand. Sometimes it’s easier to have Changkyun jerk him off than it would be to do it himself. Hyojong appreciates it. Appreciates him. He tilts his head down, seeking, bumps his half-open lips against Changkyun’s half-open mouth, and Changkyun kisses him. Kisses someone that’s not Hyojong, but Hyojong’s lips are the ones that are there, so those are the ones Changkyun contents himself to kiss.

His mouth is narrow and small and very soft, and Hyojong’s is the exact same way. When they first started doing this, Hyojong kind of couldn’t stop feeling like he was just kissing himself, but they don’t really kiss enough for it to be a problem. Changkyun’s nose gets in the way more than Hyojong’s does, and he uses more teeth. He uses them now, sinking them into Hyojong’s lower lip just a shade too hard, and Hyojong, jumpy, swallows a pained noise. Somehow this encourages Changkyun to do it again, certainly too hard, and Hyojong whines, “Ow.”

“Fuck, sorry,” Changkyun breathes. He pulls his face away and puts it back in Hyojong’s neck — no risk of hurting him if his teeth are nowhere near Hyojong’s mouth. Neither of them got any less hard during that little debacle, though, and it’s always nice with Changkyun, pressed verging-on-uncomfortably close and holding each other, clinging, hands on cocks feeling only marginally better than just the simple closeness. Hyojong buries his face in Changkyun’s hair and comes into Changkyun’s hand, and seconds later, Changkyun does the same into Hyojong’s.

They lie there, out of breath and warm, and though it’s enough for now, Hyojong knows they’re both thinking the same thing — _damn, we really need an actual top._

After brief daubs with a spare nearby shirt to clean themselves up, it’s easy for them to fall asleep. There’s no real need to talk. Hyojong has class in the morning; Changkyun is free tomorrow. When Hyojong’s alarm goes off, an ambient buzzing underneath his pillow, it’s not enough to wake Changkyun, so Hyojong leaves him there and drags himself into cargo pants and stays in the same tee he’d slept in, but at least he brushes his hair. MCMP 498, Background Sound. One of Hyojong’s favorite classes — it’s always a relaxing way to start the day, sitting there in a dimly lit room listening to recordings of the wind blowing through the trees. The best part is, if he falls back asleep, no one will notice, and in fact, people might praise him for his holistic approach to music-making. One of the many perks of being an MFA student in the “Composition and Experimental Sound Practices” program. But he doesn’t fall asleep — he’d had time for a yerba mate on his way to campus, which will give him about three hours’ worth of energy — and actually takes notes for once, then remembers he’d forgotten last night, caught up in the comfortable lethargy of Changkyun, to read his students’ papers for the class he’s co-TA’ing this semester, Composing for Improvisers. Damn. He’s TA’d it before — in fact, that’s how he met Changkyun — but since Changkyun, all of his students have been overachievers in comparison, and Hyojong is a lousy TA anyway — in fact, that’s how he _befriended_ Changkyun — and the papers-grading thing really isn’t his speed. Drat.

Too residually tired to be ashamed, he sends a quick text to Ilhoon, the other TA, saying what he always says: _overslept,didntlookatpapers,howurgentisit?icangetemdoneby18h._ Ilhoon, by now accustomed to Hyojong’s questionable habits, replies right away: _NP I got it. Adding it to IOU tally, your up to 4 now_

Fair enough. Ilhoon is a good guy, and no matter how hard Hyojong tries, he just can’t seem to hold a grudge against him. Absently, Hyojong wonders what Ilhoon could possibly use four whole IOUs for. Then his class ends the same way it began, with the professor gently snapping some twigs into a microphone and savoring the subsequent silence, and Hyojong and all three of his classmates stumble out of the classroom and into the light, temporarily stunned as they always are by the sights and sounds of the real world. While Hyojong is blinking and adjusting, a familiar shape in dark colors manifests alongside him; it seems that Changkyun woke up and came to meet Hyojong after class.

“Hey,” Changkyun says, and immediately Hyojong can tell that something has happened — there’s a rare manic edge in his eyes, and his hair is even more untamed than it usually is. “Big news. Do you have a second?”

“900,” Hyojong says. “What happened?”

Changkyun pulls him aside, out of the path of the door, and shows him his phone screen. “I should have told you when I signed us up,” he says, hurried and low, “but it was just impulsive, and it happened pretty fast, and I didn’t really think we were contenders, sorry no offense, but, like, y’know, it is what it is, but then I got this, and it’s super short notice, but what do you think?”

The screen has an email, and the email has words. _THE RENDEZVOUS PRESENTS: FALL DJ NIGHTS: 11/19 I.M/DAWN 9PM $5 COVER RSVP LINK: FB.ME/RDVDJNITE1119._ Yellow on purple and pretty tough to read, but that’s his name (it had been Changkyun’s suggestion to drop the _E’_ last year), that’s his first public gig, that’s… next Thursday.

“Oh,” Hyojong says.

“I’m sorry,” Changkyun says, still in that rushed and nervous tone. “Are you mad? We can probably still back out. Or I can do it by myself. I don’t really know if I _could_ do it by myself, but— I don’t know. It just happened so fast. I don’t know if we’d get paid for it, either. Probably? But if not I guess we’d be getting paid in exposure? Which is shitty, like, that’s bad, but we could use it? I don’t know.”

“This is so cool,” Hyojong says seriously, and Changkyun goes motionless but happy. “You’re free today, right? You can use my studio, start picking out what you wanna do, I’ll meet you there when I’m done with class.”

Changkyun blinks at him. He’s now clutching his phone to his chest like a precious thing. “You’re… not mad?”

Hyojong shakes his head. “Thank you,” he says. Neither one of them is much for big displays of gratitude, but it’s important that Changkyun knows that he’s appreciated. They blink at each other some more. “This is exciting,” Hyojong adds, but his voice can’t hold all that much emotion. He hopes Changkyun understands, anyway.

“Yeah? I’m excited, too,” Changkyun says, and starts to smile. “I screamed when I got the email and then I ran over here to tell you right away. Pretty sure these are your shoes.”

“Oh,” Hyojong says, glancing down. “They are.”

The smile is getting bigger. “Sorry,” he shrugs. “Anyway, I know it’s short notice, but you think we can pull something together?”

“Yes, definitely,” Hyojong says. Already he’s thinking of what original material he has, what remixes have played well in class, what clips from the gig he could send to his mom. Excitement is bubbling bright just behind his sternum, an unfamiliar and buoyant feeling, and he wishes he could speed up time, fast-forward through the next few hours, the next few days, until he’s taking the stage at the Rendezvous with Changkyun and, hopefully, making an impression on the world. It’s small, but he returns Changkyun’s smile, bad though they both are at maintaining eye contact. For as little as it lasts, it’s pleasant, and they look away quickly once the moment passes — Hyojong looks out across the hallway for a breath, a change of pace, and a flash of color catches his attention — red.

That buoyant excitement pops and shatters into shreds. He sees Them in slow motion, he always sees Them in slow motion, more beautiful than God and twice as rich. She’s holding onto His arm, both in sweaters, Hers loose and white, His close-fitting and baby-pink, which brings out the flame of Her hair to such a bright extent that he can’t look at Them, he can’t look, it’s too much when She laughs and Her eyes dazzle up at Him, and He’s smiling, too, confident and not entirely of this world, Their fingers linked, Her lipstick on His cheek, and They’re getting close — closer and closer, coming his way, and Hyojong is frozen, rabbit in a wolf den, prehistoric beast sinking deep into the tar and sinking further the harder he struggles. They can’t see him, he’s not ready to be seen by Them, what’s he going to do if Their eyes seek him out? What’s he going to do if Their eyes slide right past him, less consequential than a wall decoration? Schrödinger’s lover, neither wanted nor despised, so _neither_ that he may as well not exist at all. He doesn’t exist. He doesn’t exist, if unobserved. But if They observe him, he’ll shatter.

“So I’ll meet you at the studio when you’re done,” Changkyun’s voice in his ear, Changkyun’s arm around his shoulders, Changkyun’s body warm, solid, real. Not shattering. Changkyun sees what Hyojong sees. Changkyun turns them, turns them so Changkyun is between Hyojong and Them, and there’s a smile in Changkyun’s words that Hyojong is pretty sure he doesn’t mean. “Will you send me your computer login? I know most of what you’re working with, but it’ll help if I can see everything you’ve got.”

“Uh huh,” Hyojong mumbles.

“Or you can just give me your flash drive right now if that’s easier,” Changkyun suggests.

“Okay.”

“Which?”

“Yes.”

“They’re gone,” Changkyun says. “It’s fine.” He doesn’t let go of Hyojong’s shoulders right away. Hyojong focuses on the weight of his arm, the place where his fingers begin to curl around Hyojong’s bicep, holding him down against the planet. “You okay?”

“I think I’m gonna invite them,” Hyojong says, staring off at nothing in particular.

Changkyun raises his eyebrows slightly, finally releasing Hyojong, but staying close. Their sides brush as they walk. “Really? Cool. If you invite yours, I’ll invite mine.”

“You’re on,” Hyojong says grimly. The stakes for their gig just got that much higher, and all he can do is hope that they’ll be able to handle it.

They part ways, that interaction having served its purpose and therefore run its course. Changkyun’s going down to the recording studios in the basement, Hyojong along to class. Even though he should, theoretically, be focusing on low-tech musical prototyping, he’s instead sketching out the vaguest of setlists on paper, and in his brain, he’s sketching out the vaguest of — emails? Facebook messages? Letters sent by carrier pigeon? God, what could he even say? How is he supposed to express “we were in the same class fall semester last year and you’re one of the two most incredible people in the world and we’ve spoken thrice and you definitely don’t know who I am, but your girlfriend is a goddess, you’re a mythical hero, wanna come see me pressing some buttons at a skeezy club on a Thursday night?” in a way that won’t make Hwitaek file for a restraining order? Is there a way to do that? He’s starting to reconsider his pact with Changkyun. Maybe he can back out of it, he’s sure Changkyun won’t hold it against him. But just as he’s about to text Changkyun something to that very effect, Changkyun texts him first: a screenshot, his texts with Kihyun, captioned _ur move_.

It’s always oddly intimate for Hyojong, seeing the way they interact, considering he knows something Kihyun (whom he’s only met once) doesn’t. They text like strangers. Fitting, since they live like strangers who live together. But Hyojong can tell, in the way Changkyun texts Kihyun, how Changkyun feels. It’s glaringly obvious. Hyojong has always privately thought that Changkyun has it far harder than him — at least Hyojong’s heart gave him the mercy of falling in love with people he never has to see. Changkyun doesn’t have a choice. Kihyun is daily for him, inescapable unless he’s holing himself up in the studio or at Hyojong’s place. Within reach, yet unreachable by definition. Not an enviable position to be in for Changkyun. Conversely, that also means Changkyun has gotten stronger than Hyojong has, hardened through daily, constant interactions with the object of his doomed affection. Hyojong has no idea what _he_ would be like, were he to see Hyuna and Hwitaek for hours a day. He doesn’t think he could take it. Changkyun must just be stronger than him. Most people are.

After class, Hyojong joins Changkyun in the studio. They’ve both performed at on-campus showcases for their fellow students, but as far as Hyojong knows, this gig will pop their general-public cherries. Three hours, all to themselves. Getting enough material isn’t a problem, but picking and choosing the greatest hits is going to be tough. Hyojong keeps a minifridge in his studio, and if either one of them needs a nap there’s a cushy old couch Hyojong dragged down early last year, so they quite comfortably stay rooted in place until long after the rest of the students in the bustling building above them have gone home. Six days to pull together a set to win three hearts — that’s if they even come. Hyojong remembers that he still needs to find a way to invite Them and feels momentarily sick. But the syrupy bassline of Changkyun’s latest original composition settles his stomach, and they finally set out from the studio around 2 AM, having accomplished all they can for one day. Unspoken, they take the same night bus and end up at Hyojong’s apartment once again. Changkyun had been working for longer than Hyojong had, so he goes straight to bed, but Hyojong is up a little longer, staring at his phone screen, staring at blank paper — what to say, what to say, what to say?

Saturday comes. Not that time means much to them. Changkyun moves slow. Hyojong moves slower. Sometimes, they’ll spend a whole weekend together without saying a single word to each other out loud, and this weekend is one of those. For once, they’re busy, but in an internal way, where all they have to do is stay still and let their fingers and ears do all the work. Hyojong’s poor WiFi. It barely has the bandwidth for the files they’re sending back and forth, and when it finally sputters out for an hour on Sunday mid-afternoon, they while away the time in Hyojong’s bathroom, shotgunning smoke into each other’s mouths to make it last longer, exhaling up into the AC vent rather than going outside and risking sunlight. As far as collaborators go, Hyojong can’t imagine one better than Changkyun. Changkyun plays with Hyojong’s hair and likes his music a little poppy, a little danceable, where Hyojong’s focus is on unexpectedness and spontaneity, but together, it works. Hyojong records what can only loosely be called a verse for one of Changkyun’s original songs, huddled into the very back of his own closet to get an approximation of soundproofing. Changkyun returns the favor, and they’re both horribly self-conscious about their singing voices as compared to spoken word, but that’s what the autotune is for. It’s coming along, it’s coming together. Hyojong, despite being a generally nervous person, isn’t nervous about the quality of the content they’ll be performing. Everything else, though. Now that’s what keeps him up at night.

It doesn’t seem like the Rendezvous is the sort of place to actively publicize an event, and although Hyojong and Changkyun aren’t hoping for a massive turn-out, it would still be nice to have a few familiar faces in the audience, filling in around the three most crucial ones like bubble wrap around a knife. Changkyun asks some of his undergrad acquaintances. One of them, an animator, makes a very simple flyer version of the email Changkyun had received. Not necessarily in the style that Hyojong likes, but he appreciates it anyway, and prints a pessimistic 50 copies to put up around campus, not having anyone else to ask of his own. Flyers in one hand, tape in the other, he sticks them on walls on Monday and on furniture on Tuesday, and on Wednesday, he still hasn’t contacted Hyuna or Hwitaek, he doesn’t know how to, but it had been his idea in the first place, the invitation, so he can’t back down, but he’s running out of time, he _has_ run out of time, their set is ready and they ran through the whole thing to practice last night, but Hyojong is still helpless. He doesn’t know how to get the strength to do what needs to be done — what he, in fact, _wants_ to be done. It would take an act of God, or a lightning-strike of fate, to pull this off, because it’s 30 hours until the gig and They’re still uninvited. Unhappily, Hyojong sighs, bites off another inch of masking tape, and sticks a flyer right by the video game consoles in the MFA lounge, figuring it’ll get lots of traffic there. Maybe he’ll go to the library next, but he’s down to ten flyers total, so he has to distribute them wisely. He’ll go to the library, then class, then the studio for some final adjustments, then home, then…

Lightning strikes.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Hwitaek smiles, taking a light step back. “You okay?”

He hadn’t even bumped into Hyojong that hard — of course Hyojong is okay, physically, but his shoulder still stings from the aftermath of touch. Hwitaek is alone, and wearing a well-pressed button-up. Hyojong hasn’t seen Hwitaek without Hyuna in months, probably, and it looks strange, like a picture cut in half, an obvious negative space in the air to Hwitaek’s side. He’s smiling, and he’s smiling at Hyojong. Hyojong stands, stricken and electrified, and watches as if from a thousand miles away as Hwitaek’s polite smile begins to trickle into strained. “Yeah,” Hyojong replies very belatedly.

“Okay,” Hwitaek nods. He thinks Hyojong is a freak — Hyojong can see it on his gorgeous face. This is why Hyojong hides when Hwitaek and Hyuna are near, this is why he doesn’t want to make a move, because Hwitaek doesn’t even remember him, and Hyojong previously hadn’t been sure whether being an unknown or being unwanted would be worse, but now he definitely sees that he can’t possibly choose, they’re both absolutely lethal. Hwitaek is still smiling, though, and one more little nod sends him on his way, turning to resume his shining path through his own life, and Hyojong panics—

“Hey,” he croaks. “Hui, wait.”

Hwitaek turns back. His eyebrows raise. Hyojong has _no_ idea what just came over him — he’s not friends with Hwitaek, he shouldn’t know his nickname, and yet he does, and yet he just used it, and it’s too late to take it back. “Mhm?”

“I’m,” Hyojong says. Words. Fuck. Words. “There’s a, I’m doing, if you’re— here.” Fuck words, he’s better with actions. So he sticks his arm out, flyer crumpled at the corner, and actions lead him right back to words. “I’d love it if you could come.”

Hwitaek, eyebrows still up, takes the flyer. He reads it — Hyojong watches his hazel eyes. That smile, previously polite, is growing warm. “Are you I.M or Dawn?”

“Dawn,” Hyojong says.

“This is _tomorrow,”_ Hwitaek clarifies.

“Yes,” Hyojong says.

Hwitaek purses his lips, glances from the flyer to Hyojong, shrugs easily, folds it up and puts it in his breast pocket. “Okay,” he says. “Thanks.”

It’s not a yes or a no. Why isn’t it a yes or a no? While Hyojong still has him here, he may as well put himself all-in. “Bring Hyuna,” he adds.

Hwitaek, inexplicably, _laughs_ — but not unkindly, not _at_ Hyojong. Hyojong can always tell when he’s being laughed _at,_ and he’s not, right now. “Okay,” he says again, his smile so warm it might burn Hyojong into ash. He pats the pocket where he’d put the flyer, and then he really turns to go, and Hyojong, mission accomplished, doesn’t try to stop him again.

God, what a rush. Hyojong may as well levitate through the rest of his day. It’s been a year since he’s spoken to Hwitaek, a fact which is as energizing as it is pathetic. He skips the library, considering the people whose attendance he cares most about have already been informed, and considers skipping class, but what would he do, in the studio all by himself or home alone? He’s never good at solitude when he has this much excess nervous energy. So he forces himself to sit through his electroacoustics seminar and keeps his time in the studio to below an hour — what’s done is mostly done. Even a chronic overthinker such as himself can see that there’s not much use in polishing what’s already lost all its rough edges. He just goes home, texts Changkyun to come over whenever, and watches a couple hours’ worth of Disney Channel reruns rather than doing his actual assignments. He wouldn’t be able to focus on anything else, anyway. He keeps replaying his conversation with Hwitaek in his head — the way Hwitaek had smiled, had smiled directly at him. He touches his shoulder where Hwitaek had accidentally checked him. What if They come? What if They don’t? Hyojong shivers, bundles himself up very firmly in two hoodies and two blankets, and watches _That’s So Raven_ until he hears his door unlock and Changkyun shuffle in.

“I invited them,” Hyojong says, when Changkyun has pulled off his shoes and gotten on the couch by his side, tugging to steal an edge of one blanket. Changkyun’s eyes go as wide and surprised as they can, and Hyojong relays the whole story to his rapt audience, knowing that this is the only person in the world who won’t find it horrifically underwhelming. Still, there’s not much to tell, and they sit there in silence for a moment, both considering whether Hwitaek’s words and reaction mean he and Hyuna will be in attendance at the Rendezvous tomorrow. In a way, Hyojong thinks, it might not even matter. He spoke to Hwitaek — Hwitaek knows his name and face. He’s better off than he’d been before, no matter what happens tomorrow.

“Well,” Changkyun says, looking a little shifty, “I have some news, too.” He leans forward to show Hyojong, brushing his overgrown bangs out of his face, and God damn, glinting at the end of his left eyebrow is a silver barbell through slightly pinked skin.

It suits him, and Hyojong can tell that Changkyun loves it but is too modest to say so outright or even ask for Hyojong’s opinion. “Wow,” Hyojong says, also leaning in to see it better. “Did it hurt a lot?”

“Not at the moment,” Changkyun says, then pauses thoughtfully, as if asking his own body how it feels. “It kinda hurts now, though.”

“It’s cool,” Hyojong says. “Wear your hair back tomorrow, show it off.”

“You think?”

“Yeah.”

They sit there for a moment, watching the images flickering over the TV screen without really seeing them, both miles away. Then Changkyun, tacitly declaring the moment over, reaches into his bag to pull out his laptop, and Hyojong does the same, and they play their set just to hear it all at once. If the stakes were high before, now, with Kihyun semi-confirmed and Hwitaek and Hyuna at least informed, they’re stratospheric. But in the way Changkyun bobs his head along to the music and in the way Hyojong doesn’t feel a ball of nervous tension underneath his ribs, Hyojong can tell that they’re happy with their progress, with their partnership. He even gauges it safe to leave Changkyun alone for a few minutes while he goes to CVS for snacks, and he comes back with snacks and a box of black hair dye. Changkyun sees the box in the bag, then looks at Hyojong, and Hyojong looks at Changkyun. In unison, they shrug, and forty minutes later, Hyojong is lying back with his head dripping into his never-used bathtub so Changkyun can wash the dye out.

Changkyun’s hands are always gentle. He’s not wearing gloves — he probably should have, his fingers are already stained. When Hyojong had had no choice but to take on the position of TA last fall, how could he ever have predicted this? Teaching wasn’t his cup of tea, and so he skipped his own class more often than he’d gone, and gradually, he kept seeing the same undergraduate face in the same places he was lurking to hide out until class was over. Gradually, they sat closer and closer together, until they collectively bit the bullet and started going to sessions together again and, eventually, submitted a team project for Changkyun’s final presentation. Hyojong has never been good at making friends; he’s even worse at keeping them. So it came as revelation and relief when, after the end of fall semester, Changkyun followed him on Instagram, and when spring semester began, they fell easily into a new version of the old routine, meeting at the studio on purpose to work on music, get high, commiserate. Very little has changed since then — if anything, it’s changed for the better. Changkyun tells Hyojong when to close his eyes so he can run the stream of water over his head, and although the water is painfully cold, Hyojong doesn’t feel it.

“Gerard Way,” Changkyun pronounces pensively, both of them looking at Hyojong’s damp reflection. “Edward Scissorhands.”

Hyojong knows those are compliments of the highest order and feels warm, blinking at himself. He hasn’t had dark hair in years — part of him feels like he’s transformed into a different person entirely. If that's the case, can his personality change, too? Can he be bold and brave and talk to Hyuna and Hwitaek, if they really do come tomorrow? He puts a towel over his pillow so he doesn’t stain it black. Changkyun, who usually sleeps on his left, has to sleep on his back so he doesn’t irritate his new piercing. Everything is changing, like dead skin sloughing off. Neither of them can sleep, Hyojong can hear by his breathing that Changkyun’s awake, but they don’t want to talk, they don’t want to acknowledge that they’re nervous, so they just lie there in dark silence until, eventually, it’s morning.

They’re expected at the Rendezvous half an hour before the gig is set to start, but they agree to meet a full hour before just in case of technical difficulties. For once Changkyun is the one with an early class, and they part ways temporarily knowing that when they reunite, everything is going to be just a little bit different. This is the night where things take a turn. Hyojong keeps catching glimpses of himself in windows and laptop screens as he passes by and getting startled — who is that raven-haired stranger? Is he someone worth falling in love with? Will he know what to do tonight? Hyojong hopes at least one of them does. If not, Changkyun’s eyebrow piercing will make up the difference.

Minimal lunch — a handful of nuts and dried fruits. Hyojong is, by now, so nervous that he’s cycled back around to utterly devoid of feeling, and he doesn’t see Them anywhere on-campus, and if he hadn’t spotted one of his own flyers along a stairwell, he could almost have forgotten that the gig is tonight. But eventually, he’s done with his classes, and makes his way back home to change and smudge some makeup on. He keeps his outfit simple — comfortable grey jeans, a simple white collared shirt, and an oversized David Byrne blazer. Changkyun said Gerard Way; Hyojong is leaning into it. At the last second, just as he’s finished lacing up his Chucks, he goes back and grabs a lilac tie and watches a YouTube video on how to tie it properly. He knows it’s not a formal occasion in the slightest, but it’s his first performance for the real world. Everything up until this point has just been dreams, and he’ll treat this as the job interview that it may or may not be. He wonders what Changkyun is going to wear. It would be funny if their trains of thought were on the same schedule and if Changkyun shows up in semi-formal, too. Hyojong listens to a sample of his set as he takes the bus to the Rendezvous and doesn’t mind any looks that he gets from his fellow commuters. The sun has long since set, and Hyojong leans his head against the bus window and thinks about where it is right now, what part of the world is currently illuminated. He texts Changkyun: _almostthere_

Changkyun replies: _just arrived_

It’s not necessarily disheartening that he didn’t provide any further information — on any current attendees, for example — because Changkyun is a minimalist when it comes to texting Hyojong. It could mean anything. Or it could mean certain doom. Hyojong’s nervousness is tapping against the wall holding it back, a predatory fish trapped underneath thin ice. The bus is going too fast and too slow all at once. Hyojong takes deep breaths and tells himself that, no matter how much he wants the bus to go faster or slower, it will go at exactly the pace it’s going until they arrive. He repeats that in his head until the bus stops two blocks away from the Rendezvous, and Hyojong walks the rest of the way, his backpack with his laptop and launchpad held tightly against his chest. He doesn’t care if he wrinkles his tie and blazer. Nobody’s going to be there yet, he tells himself. It’s an hour before the gig starts — probably not even Changkyun’s undergrad friends from across disciplines have shown up. Yet. Who else hasn’t shown up, yet? If nobody shows up at all, it leaves open the possibility of _anyone_ showing up. Hyojong puzzles over this philosophical problem while his body acts on its own to get out his ID and show the bouncer at the door and then go in, walking him back and through, to meet Changkyun at the DJ stand.

Changkyun isn’t wearing semi-formal. He’s gone full e-boy; black and white striped shirt underneath a black tee, artfully distressed skinny jeans, combat boots, chains. Black nail polish on seemingly random fingers. And his hair is pushed back like Hyojong had suggested, but he’s wearing a beret. “Is the beret too much?” he asks once Hyojong is within earshot.

“Why are you asking me? I wore a tie,” Hyojong shrugs.

Changkyun looks at the tie and takes the beret off.

They set up together. Laptops, launchpads, Changkyun’s mini keyboard. Headphones. Sound check, mic check. Time ticks on. There’s something wrong with Changkyun. Through this whole process, he’s been the instigator, the mover, the ringleader. But he’s a shadow of himself, even more than usual, and the dark rings under his eyes aren’t drawn on the way Hyojong’s are. Hyojong doesn’t have the words to ask if he’s alright, but he stands closer to him, and sees the way Changkyun’s hands shake — especially when they both check the time. T-minus thirty. People are beginning to arrive. People have _been_ arriving, but they’re just normal bar-goers, not giving the entertainers a second look. But Hyojong sees three mullets in a row and knows they’re there for them.

“I think your friends are here,” Hyojong mumbles to Changkyun, and Changkyun jolts violently and looks up from his laptop so fast that Hyojong hears a joint in his body crack, but the tension goes out of him when he sees who it is and sends them a small, meek wave. The mullets wave back, and so do the people to whom the mullets are attached. Hyojong watches Changkyun for a moment, then returns his eyes to his laptop. The Rendezvous’ WiFi is far slower than his own, and it’s taking a while to boot up Soundcloud. “Is your computer working?”

“Yeah, mostly,” Changkyun replies. Hyojong knows that having a menial task to focus on is a great way to get Changkyun out of an anxious spiral, and it works as it always does — Changkyun leans in to check out Hyojong’s laptop, identifies the problem, fixes it, and by the time he’s done, he looks less like he’s dying. More colorful characters are entering the Rendezvous, and Hyojong’s keeping an eye on the door, looking for red. No red yet. Yet. That’s his favorite word right now — nothing _yet._ Not here _yet._ Not panicking _yet._ Yet will get him through this. And Changkyun’s fine. The manager of the club brings them each a bottle of water and thanks them, in a cursory way, for doing this, and confirms Changkyun’s suspicion; they’re being paid only in exposure. It could still end up being worth it. Now Hyojong and Changkyun are both staring at the door.

Fifteen minutes. Under normal circumstances, Changkyun would probably go and talk to his friends and acquaintances, who are drinking and laughing and taking places along the fringes of the dance floor. Even Hyojong sees a couple of people he thinks might have come either from his flyers or from having six degrees of separation with him — even Ilhoon came, which is unexpected but sweet. He should probably, theoretically, go and say hello. But they’re both locked in behind the DJ stand, ostensibly tweaking their sound levels to match the Rendezvous’ speakers, bass up treble down, but actually hyperaware of everything _but_ the equipment in front of them. Every time the door creaks, they both go rigid, then exhale. But it’s fine. Hyojong’s nervousness has sunk back down to the riverbed. And Changkyun is verging on manic, but he’s fine.

Ten minutes. The door lets in a man and a woman, but the wrong ones. A compact and glittering dancer type breaks away from the bar to try and come say hello to Changkyun, but when he sees the look on his face, he turns around and goes right back to his ludicrously tall friend, who is chatting with the ludicrously tall friend of one-third of the mullets. Changkyun doesn’t notice, but he seems fine. Hyojong would ask how he’s doing, but he still can’t find the words.

Five minutes. Hyojong sips his water. He feels ready. There’s still no sign of Hyuna and Hwitaek, but at this point, he’s tortured himself over it so much that he feels he can handle anything. “Hyojong,” Changkyun mutters. “Hyojong, I think I’m really freaking out.”

“I think you’re fine,” Hyojong starts to say, but then actually looks at him and stops. “Oh.”

Changkyun is visibly trembling, just a little, and Hyojong has never seen him like this. He flinches when Hyojong tries to catch his gaze. Hyojong steps closer to him, for once not feeling the crushing weight of every pair of eyes in the room potentially pointed his way. “Is it because—” Hyojong asks, and Changkyun shakes his head quickly, then pauses, then nods, jerkily, just once, but his face is still saying no.

“It’s— everything. Performing. Everyone. But also— but also, mainly, that,” he says. “Hyojong, I need— I…”

Hyojong looks over Changkyun’s head at the digital clock on the wall. Their set is due to start in four minutes and thirty seconds. But they’re the headliners, the one and only act — this thing runs on their schedule. “Come on,” he mumbles, takes Changkyun by the wrist, and leads him out from behind the DJ stand and deeper, into the back of the Rendezvous. Not all the way, though. Hyojong hasn’t been here before, he doesn’t trust himself not to get them lost. But there’s a wall with a hallway behind it, the hallway presumably leading to bathrooms and/or offices, and Hyojong tucks Changkyun up against the exposed brick in the farthest corner. “What do you—”

Changkyun pushes in to kiss him. Hyojong had already figured that that’s what Changkyun would need, so it doesn’t come as a surprise; he’s kissing back in milliseconds, Changkyun’s black-tipped fingers push into Hyojong’s black hair and Hyojong presses his tongue to Changkyun’s lower lip until his mouth opens. They’re only semi-private — the noise of the club is muffled, but not muted. Somehow, that’s not enough to make Hyojong slow down. Nobody’s going to come looking for them. Changkyun needs — needs him, in this moment. And Hyojong is here.

Hyojong cages Changkyun a little more securely against the wall, not minding the unyielding surface. He sucks at Changkyun’s tongue and moves one hand to click and fumble through the chains on Changkyun’s belt, even though normally it takes them longer to reach this point. Yes, the show is on their schedule, but there’s no need to drag this out. Hyuna and Hwitaek could be out there already — Hyojong, unexpectedly, shudders at the thought, and Changkyun is getting hard fast under his exploratory hand, bending needy closer to him, his breaths whining out of his kissed mouth. He needs more. Hyojong knows what he needs. It’s not something he knows how to give on any ordinary day, but this is extraordinary, and he can do it. For Changkyun — for himself — for both of them.

He moves his other hand, his free hand, up to tangle in Changkyun’s hair and pull. The effect is immediate. Changkyun’s jaw drops and his whine jumps higher, head immediately falling back, wordlessly begging for more. Hyojong curls his fingers tight around his cock, kisses the side of his throat. This is about the extent of his abilities, but Changkyun doesn’t seem to mind. He’s getting what he needs. Hyojong closes his eyes, pictures, just briefly, how Changkyun must feel. Pushed against a wall and ravished, hair pulled to bare his neck, vulnerable and available. Who’s going to do this for Hyojong? He wants it — oh, he wants it. Needy, too, he rocks his hips forward to give Changkyun a hint, and Changkyun uses both hands to undo his jeans and pull his dick out, hold him, stroke him.

Hyojong moans, but he needs to be quiet, they need to be quiet. He kisses Changkyun’s neck and Changkyun is holding back sounds, too, Hyojong can feel them working underneath the skin of his throat. Hyojong tightens his fingers in Changkyun’s hair and Changkyun gasps, “Kih— …keep doing that.”

It’s not the first time that’s happened for either of them, so it passes by unremarked upon. Hyojong twists his hand slightly to give Changkyun continued pulling on his hair without having to put in extra effort, while he’s still jerking him with a tighter grip than usual, hurrying this along as much as he can. He can hear that there are more people out there now, past the wall. Any one or two of them could come and see them — swap them out. Normally Hyojong finds it a little disrespectful to think actively about other people while he’s fooling around with Changkyun, but now he can’t stop, it’s too tantalizing, knowing that They really could be within 300 feet of him while he comes. The thought is mildly overwhelming and his face is warm in the side of Changkyun’s neck, his body shuffling closer as if to hide. Changkyun keeps stroking him, leaning his head back against the wall, rasping harsh breath against the air, and Hyojong scrapes his nails through Changkyun’s hair. Changkyun shivers and arches like a cat. Their mouths find each other out of habit, and this time, Hyojong is the one to get carried away with the teeth, but Changkyun, of course, doesn’t stop him.

Changkyun feels better. Hyojong can tell. But Hyojong is getting close, and he didn’t think ahead enough to plan for the possibilities of orgasm. He pulls at Changkyun’s hair to communicate a message rather than to transmit pleasure, and Changkyun understands him perfectly, as he always does. With one hand still on Hyojong’s dick, Changkyun sinks to his knees and drinks Hyojong down his throat, and Hyojong can guess that he’s jacking himself off, too. The nervous energy and the thought of other mouths and the warmth, the talented tongue, the eager, expert way Changkyun sucks him, all has Hyojong spilling over in seconds, and as a courtesy, he keeps his fingers clenched in Changkyun’s hair. But he loosens as soon as he’s done — cruelty’s just not in his nature. Changkyun seems inclined to stay on his knees, but Hyojong, panting to catch his breath, helps him up, and Changkyun slumps against him as Hyojong’s hand wraps around his cock again, and it’s over soon. They breathe. Their heads clear. Changkyun kisses Hyojong’s neck, just once, and mumbles, “Thank you.”

“Stay here a sec,” Hyojong mumbles back and carefully props Changkyun up on the wall, then follows the other side of the hallway until he finds the bathroom — handful of paper towels and he’s back, they’re both cleaned and tidied, Changkyun with his slicked hair now messy at the back is good as new. Hyojong is, too.

“We’re late to our own show,” Changkyun says, but he’s smiling.

“Guess that means we’re ready to be famous,” Hyojong replies seriously, and they walk out the same way they’d came, but now the lights are down, the audience is gathered on the floor, and they’re no longer Changkyun and Hyojong — they’re I.M and Dawn, and this is their fucking gig.

They’re three songs in before Hyojong can lift his eyes from his laptop. Changkyun is doing all of the talking — “I am I.M, he’s Dawn, thanks for coming out tonight,” “this one’s an original,” “sing along if you know the words” — and Hyojong is making sure the queue is running smoothly. Velvet Underground bleeds into Talking Heads bleeds into Depeche Mode bleeds into Lim and Kim Productions. He looks up from his laptop, and he sees it. Red.

There. By the bar. Red. Alternating brighter and dimmer under the dusty disco ball. Red. That shade — Hyojong would know it anywhere. He’s crossed the street to see parked cars that color red. Hyuna, Hyuna. And Hwitaek with her. Are they listening? Are they watching? Someone’s in front of them, a momentary distraction, but this is it, this is the moment, this is when they see him, this is— this is—

This is the moment where it hits Hyojong that dreams are dreams for a reason. It’s hard to pull something like that into waking life and have it retain its shape. Hyuna and Hwitaek came, they’re there, but they’re wrapped up in each other, staring only into one another’s eyes, his hands on her waist, her arms around his shoulders, tips of noses rubbing, lips whispering into ears, lips whispering onto lips. In the two-second lull between songs, Changkyun follows Hyojong’s look, and sees them, too, but there’s nothing he can do.

Hyuna and Hwitaek make out through the whole show. They don’t even look at the DJ stand once. Hyojong knows this because he doesn’t take his eyes off of them. As for Changkyun’s delegation, his friends ebb and flow throughout the three-hour set, but one is noticeably absent. At least Hyuna and Hwitaek came — even though Hyojong may as well be wallpaper to them. Kihyun didn’t even show up.

Midnight strikes, and carriage becomes pumpkin at a shockingly surprising turnaround rate, considering how sleepy the Rendezvous had seemed. “Thanks, guys, we’ll keep your contact info on our list, maybe you could do this again sometime,” says the manager. Changkyun, a numb automaton, packs his equipment up. Hyojong is exhausted, his skin feels physically sore from how much he’d been looked at tonight, but the looks that would take all the pain away remain elusive. They’re still here, somehow — they’d stayed through the whole set. That must be a good sign, it must be. Do they want to talk to him? Hyojong unplugs his laptop and his launchpad and slips them into his backpack and glances at Changkyun.

“Go,” Changkyun says, sounding hollow.

It seems unfair. It _is_ unfair. But Hyojong goes. He zips his backpack, he leaves it by Changkyun to pick up later, he takes a step, he takes another step, they’re in his sights, they’re waiting for him, and they’re turning, and they’re walking, and Hwitaek is holding the door, and Hyuna is laughing and thanking him, and her hair leaves a burning afterimage on Hyojong’s retinas as they slip out and into the night, leaving nothing behind, never looking back.

Hyojong stands there. He stands there. He looks at the closed door. He doesn’t know what it means. He looks back over his shoulder, and Changkyun has finished stuffing his own bag and is scrubbing a tired hand down his face. Smaller, from a distance. He’s not checking his phone — he must be frightened of what he might say, given the chance. He sees Hyojong looking, and the expression on his face is a mirror.

Still, Hyojong thinks. Even still, no matter what happens. Changkyun is a good friend to go to bed with.

**Author's Note:**

> don't worry. changki and triple h are in happy committed relationships within 14 calendar days of this.
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/paratazxis) / [curiouscat](https://curiouscat.me/paratazxis) / [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3DewLUJGQhHHZ29aG4FZpi?si=huoTJfCjRvW7ZO3EpW9Mjw)
> 
> STARRING: MADDIE MOBLIT AS KIHYUN, TAZ CHERISHISKISA AS CHANGKYUN, TAZ CHERISHISKISA AS UNNAMED STUDENT WHO MADE THE UGLY FLYER. also starring: hongjoong, minghao, and seungyoun as the "three mullets"; ten as the glittery dancer; lucas and mingi as the ludicrously tall "friends"; ilhoon and taemin as the people who came there for hyojong >:3 also, all the classes mentioned are real classes that apparently exist at calarts.
> 
> thank you so much for reading, and thank you again to yuta for the commission!!! i had SO so so SO sososososo much fun writing this and i really sincerely hope you enjoyed it, pls leave a comment (or come chat at links above) and lmk what you thought!!!! honestly ... if cajoled enough .... i might write a sequel explaining how they all get together ...... or something ........ because i am literally obsessed with "everyone goes to calarts" verse .... ANYWAY !!!!! 2/3 commissions done, the last one will be even sillier than this! so see you guys next time, and until then ... stay emo out there


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